Education, From The Capitol To The Classroom

Stories about students: How does education policy affect the way students learn and grow? Can schools meet their needs as they balance ramped-up testing with personal changes and busy schedules? And are students who need help getting it?

Stories about educators: How are those responsible for implementing education policy in schools − from classroom teachers, to district administrators, to school board members − affected by changes at the top? And how well do they meet their challenge of reaching students with varying abilities and needs?

Stories about school assessment: With an increased push for 'accountability' in schools, what can test scores tell us about teacher effectiveness and student learning − and what can't they tell us? What does the data say about how schools at all levels are performing?

Stories about government influence: Who are the people and groups most instrumental in crafting education policy? What are their priorities and agendas? And how do they work together when they disagree?

Stories about money: How do local, state, and federal governments pay to support the education policies they craft? How do direct costs of going to school − from textbooks to tuition − hit a parent or student's bottom line? And how do changing budgets and funding formulas affect learning and teaching?

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Bennett announced a partnership with the University of Notre Dame and the National Math and Science Initiative aimed at increasing the number and quality of AP courses across the state, especially in math and science.

The program will focus initially on nine high schools, including Perry Meridian, Southport, Speedway and Pike. The goal is to expand to 33 schools within five years.

“It is the focus of this administration,” Bennett said, “that we lead the nation in AP”…

Along with Indiana and Colorado, which also just signed onto the national AP program, there are six other states involved in the budding national effort to grow AP. In Indiana, schools were picked after site visits to gauge readiness and buy-in.

On one hand, GOOD Education writes about a College Board survey suggesting too many students aren’t enrolled in an Advanced Placement course, even though they have the potential to succeed in one:

[The College Board] analyzed the performance of 771,000 PSAT-takers from the class of 2011 and discovered that 478,000 students—over 60 percent—did not take an AP exam even though their test scores indicated they could do well on one. In particular, the College Board found that high scoring students from black, Latino, and Native American backgrounds are “much less likely than their white and Asian peers” to take AP exams.

Photo Illustration by Kyle Stokes / StateImpact Indiana

For some, the natural fear is that schools allow students who are underqualified to take AP courses the same access as students who are qualified, degrading the program’s quality. There’s some evidence to suggest this phenomenon hasn’t completely undermined AP courses as the program has grown.

But writing in a New York Times point-counterpoint feature, Virginia teacher Patrick Welsh — an AP Literature and Composition instructor — disagrees with that assessment:

The College Board is shamelessly pressuring public schools by creating the impression that AP courses are the only ones worth taking… In the last 10 years, Advanced Placement has become a game of labels and numbers, a public relations ploy used by school officials who are dumping as many students as they can into AP courses to create the illusion that they are raising overall standards and closing the gap between whites and minorities. In fact, they are doing just the opposite.

A word about the National Math & Science Initiative, which is furnishing the $7 million grant to pay for nine Indiana high schools to offer more AP courses: It’s a huge national effort, funded by top-name corporate sponsors and foundations, from ExxonMobil to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, to the College Board, to AT&T.

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Comments

Greg Hessee

“There’s some evidence to suggest this phenomenon hasn’t completely undermined AP courses as the program has grown.” This pointlessly biased statement refers to part 3 of a 5-part analysis that, as of yet, has no actual results to testify for or against the value of developing an AP course.
Mr. Stokes has failed to discover any real data that speaks to whether increases in AP enrollment are preparing students or not for college. That being said, if he had spent time on on the program’s website (http://www.nationalmathandscience.org/programs/ap-training-incentive-programs), read Kirabo Jackson’s analysis in the National Bureau of Economic Research this February, reviewed “Rising Above the Gathering Storm” from the National Academy of Sciences, or reviewed any of College Board’s annual Reports to the Nation, he would have reason to change the preceding statement to “there’s only evidence to suggest this phenomenon is increasing our students’ chances of graduating from college and entering fields which will increase our global competitiveness.